Well here we are – the end of the semester and the last of my weekly book reviews for my readers' advisory class. Out of all the genres we covered, I've read more of the nonfiction titles mentioned in the class than any of the other genre books we could choose from to review. I was a journalism major in undergrad and have always loved narrative nonfiction, so it's no real surprise that I've read a lot of it.

It's easy to identify what is nonfiction in comparison to fiction, however, how to distinguish nonfiction titles from each other is much more tricky. The narrative context plays a large role. Is the book written like a novel or does it read more like interesting facts presented as research? Can an "Average Joe" (or Jane) read it easily, or does there need to be more of a specialized education to understand the material? I think the easiest way to start to narrow down what sort of nonfiction book a person is looking to read is the subject, followed by time period and/or setting. The type of nonfiction (biography, memoir, essays, letters, etc.) also plays a large role. Pacing, characterization, story line and setting are all additional determining factors for suggesting nonfiction to a reader, just as they are for fiction.

This week's assigned nonfiction title was The Sixth Extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert, which I really enjoyed. It was rather scary though (much more of a "horror" pick for me than World War Z!) as it alluded to the likelihood of human beings causing the world's next major extinction. While I still really enjoyed the book, I found myself thinking that the pacing was a little slower than I would normally prefer, and the narrative context was a bit more scientific at times than I would have liked. However, these elements did not at all make me dislike the book.

For the nonfiction book of my choosing, I selected Erik Larson's The Devil in White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America. Not only does the title sound intriguing, word on the street is that professional actor/dreamboat Leonardo DiCaprio and film genius Martin Scorsese will be reuniting for a film adaptation of the story, set to release in 2017. So naturally, I had to read the book before the movie comes out. Below is my review.

I give this book:★★★★

After recovering from a devastating fire a couple of decades prior, 1890s Chicago was a time of progress and excitement. With the dawn of the 20th century approaching, now was the perfect time for ambitious architect Daniel Burnham to make a name for himself, his city, and his country by championing Chicago as the site of the 1893 World’s Fair.

In the midst of all of the construction, increased tourism and general exhilaration the Fair brought to the city, another man known by H.H. Holmes (and many other aliases) found it was also the perfect time to pursue his passion – one that would eventually earn him the title of America’s first serial killer.

The Devil in White City is really a book of two true stories. The first is that of Burnham’s professional struggles and ultimate triumph to pull off one of the greatest patriotic events in American history. The second and more gruesome is that of Holmes and his habitual acts of fraud, manipulation, seduction and murder. The juxtaposition of these two narratives makes for a well-researched and captivating story sure to be enjoyed by lovers of true crime stories and history buffs alike!

In addition to having a similar title, Joel Engel’s bookL.A. '56: A Devil in the City of Angelshits on a lot of the same areas of interest as Larson’s 2002 work. Another telling of a true crime story occurring in America’s past, L.A. ’56 details Detective Danny Galindo’s quest to track down a serial rapist terrorizing the city’s young women. Detailing Los Angeles’ contentious racial relations during this historic time of segregation, L.A. ’56 is another real-life and historic thriller to be quickly read and enjoyed. Truman Capote's well-known work In Cold Blood also comes to mind as a gripping read-alike.

Out of all the genres covered in my readers' advisory class, it looks like we've saved the best genres – or at least, my favorites – for last. This week we covered mainstream fiction, which is definitely my most-read genre. To me, mainstream fiction can be determined based on how you would describe the book to another person. Some books you can clearly say, "Well it's a mystery about _____," or "It's a really exciting thriller about ____." When it comes to mainstream fiction, there isn't necessarily an easy label to describe it with like there is for genre fiction.

Mainstream fiction is more about the story itself, whereas genre fiction is about the type of story that it is, if that makes sense. Whereas I think literary fiction tends to be a bit more lofty and reminds many people of the books they've read in high school English classes, mainstream fiction generally does not require as much literature analysis, it can just be read and enjoyed for what it is while still having substance.

This week our assigned novel was All The Light We Cannot Seeby Anthony Doerr, which I absolutely loved. It had been on my to-read list for quite a while and this course finally got it pushed up a few places. I listened to the book on audio in the car and thought it was extremely well done. I'm a bit of a Francophile, so anything set it France or includes French generally gets two thumbs up from me. That, and the Museum of Natural History in Paris (where the beginning of the story takes place) is hands down my favorite museum I've ever been to. I find books and movies about WWII also tend to be pretty incredible since it was such a fascinating and devastating time in history, so there's lots for the author to work with. This book was great because it also appeals to readers of historical fiction. It checked all the boxes for me as far as character, setting, language and plot, and was the only assigned book for that class that I gave as five stars from this class (although many of them did get four).

The mainstream fiction title of my choosing for the week was Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel. While I'm not always a huge fan of dystopian fiction, as I think it's been a little bit overdone as of late, I loved that this book was written in more of that literary fiction style. Below is my review.

It’s not often that a book can be both science fiction and mainstream, but Station Eleven is. Alternating between different characters and settings, Station Eleven is a realistic dystopian story that takes place before, during and after the collapse of modern civilization due to a pandemic flu.

The story begins one snowy night at a Canadian theater just hours before the global virus outbreak. The production stars famous actor Arthur Leander in the lead role of Shakespeare’s King Lear, but the show can’t go on when he suddenly collapses dead on stage.

Fifteen years after the Georgia Flu epidemic, an actress named Kristen travels the Great Lakes region with a nomadic band of actors and musicians known as the Traveling Symphony. The troupe’s motto is “Survival is insufficient,” as they journey town to town preforming the works of Shakespeare for others who are also still alive. But when they arrive in the next town the Symphony encounters a violent, self-proclaimed prophet who does all he can to prevent anyone from ever leaving again.​St. John Mandel masterfully weaves together diverse characters and details of various subplots, resulting in an incredible story about the resilience of people. Station Eleven is speculative fiction at its finest.

I give this book:★★★★★

Another excellent read that takes place in the future aftermath of a devastating plague is The Country of Ice Cream Star by Sandra Newman. This dystopian thriller features fifteen-year-old Ice Cream Star and her wandering tribe made up almost entirely of children. The plague is a strange disease called Posies that has been killing people before reaching the age of 20 for generations. When her brother starts showing symptoms, Ice Cream Star sets off on a quest desperate to find a rumored cure.

Science fiction is a really interesting genre to me because I always sort of discounted it as not being "for me," but every Sci-Fi book I've read I've actually enjoyed. Maybe Sci-Fi is for me, I just didn't know it before. A few of the reading stepping stones I took in my readers' advisory course that made me realize I like Sci-Fi were John Scalzi's 2005 book Old Man's War and the 1979 classic,The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy​ by Douglas Adams.

Old Man's War was the required reading for the course's Sci-Fi week, and while I initially approached it thinking, "Oh boy, a story about an old man in space ... I can hardly contain my excitement ..." I actually thought it was quite good! In particular, the humor of the book and the way it portrayed the humanity of the characters – even those who were not really "humans" – was impeccable. Overall, it was just a really well written novel with a neat concept, and one of my favorites that I've read for this class so far.

And for the Sci-Fi book of my choosing this week, I could not pass up one of the most canonical titles of the genre. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is hands down one of the funniest – if not the funniest – books I've ever read. Below is my review.

I give this book:★★★★★

When Arthur Dent discovers his house is about to be bulldozed to make room for a new bypass, he thinks his world is over. Within the hour, his world is over – or at least it’s been destroyed. Coincidentally, Earth also needed to be demolished to make room for a new bypass, albeit an intergalactic one.

Luckily, Arthur is able to escapes Earth’s destruction thanks to his friend Ford Perfect who is, as it just so happens to turn out, actually from another planet entirely. Ford has not actually been living on Earth all these years he’s known Arthur, but rather has been temporarily trapped there as he travels from planet to planet writing new entries for the ultimate interstellar encyclopedia known as The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.

Hilarity ensues as the duo bounces from spaceship to spaceship and they meet a very strange variety of characters along the way. Perhaps one of the most classic and timeless works of humorous science fiction to ever be published, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy will have you laughing out loud and never wanting the madness to end. Luckily for you, there are four other books in the series.

Another canonical and hilarious science fiction book is Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle. Similar to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy,this book is also a story of global destruction dripping with deadpan humor and irony, although it is a bit heavier in content. This book is another great example of a Sci-Fi “oldie, but goodie,” originally published in 1963.

Horror week in my readers' advisory class was an interesting one. I’m not one to be particularly attracted to horror generally speaking, however, once in a while it strikes me – maybe only when the moon is full? This week I found myself thinking a lot about the horror genre as it pertains to films. Many a horror book finds its way to the big screen, and generally it involves some sort of supernatural element, particularly hauntings and possessions as of late. Horror movies nowadays seem to be moving away from the psycho serial killer thing that makes up most of the classics like Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday the 13th and Halloween. Interestingly, the non-supernatural element that makes up canonical horror films like those listed above does not pertain to horror books, where by definition there is almost always a supernatural occurrence.

This week the assigned class horror title was World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War​by Max Brooks, and frankly, I did not enjoy it. It was a cool concept for a book, but not for me. I listened to WWZ on audiobook, and since the book follows a whole range of global characters, the narrator changed with each person in the book, which was really neat. However, I found the book difficult to enjoy because none of the different characters or subplots really related to each other, other than the fact that they all took place after the zombie outbreak. As far as recommending this book to someone, they would definitely have to be interested in zombies to like it. A person looking for a general horror book without much interest in zombies or post-apocalyptic material would probably not enjoy this one very much.

The horror title I chose to read for this week was Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz. I personally found this one more of a supernatural thriller than a horror book, and enjoyed it quite a lot as seen in the review below.

The first installment of the Odd Thomas series introduces the 20-year-old clairvoyant fry cook of the same name as he navigates life in Pico Mundo, California. Odd is, as his name suggests, a little different than most people – most significantly he sees dead people (including Elvis)!

When he’s not frying up breakfast at the Pico Mundo Grill or spending time with his soulmate of a girlfriend, Stormy Llewellyn, Odd can be found wandering the fictional desert town helping the ghosts he meets resolve their unfinished business and pass on from this world.

One day when Odd sees a strange man enter the restaurant followed by a horde of mysterious bodachs – a clear indicator of imminent evil – he gets a psychic feeling that he’s about to start seeing a lot more ghosts in town.​Aside from the types of real life terrors mentioned in this book, it’s pretty tame as far as horror goes. Filled with a few mutilated body parts here and a few good chuckles there, this title is a paranormal thriller that probably won't keep you awake at night. With the last and final Odd Thomas book released last year, this book will make you want to pick up the other six titles in the series – and fast!

I give this book:★★★★

For a read-alike option, Stoker Award winning author Douglas Clegg offers another paranormal thriller with minimal blood and gore in his 2004 book Afterlife. Following the mysterious murder of her husband Jeff, Julie starts having nightmares about her late husband’s involvement in Project Daylight, a now-defunct, privately-funded school that conducted experiments on kids with ESP. With the help of her family and a popular TV psychic, Julie unearths unnerving secrets that she never would have imagined.

The next genre covered in my readers' advisory course was the one that really got me into reading. I mean, I always liked to read, but once Harry Potter hit the scene it became one of my favorite pastimes. I grew up with Harry & Co., and while waiting for the last book to come out in 8th grade, I read the Lord of the Rings trilogy to kill some time, and earlier this year finished reading all of the Game of Thrones books that have been released, so far *cough cough*. I plan to get around to the Outlander series eventually too, so I'm definitely not a stranger to big, long book series that tend to make up much of this genre!

The required class book for this week was Hounded, the first book in author Kevin Hearne's series, the Iron Druid Chronicles. While I probably wouldn’t have picked it up if I were browsing for a new book to read myself based on the cover art or book description, I found myself quite enjoying it. It has a lot of Irish folklore blended in with the usual fantastical creatures like werewolves and vampires, though not in the traditional sense. There's also some really tremendous humor in the book – particularly from the mouth of a snarky Irish wolfhound named Oberon, who can communicate with his druidic owner and the series main character, Atticus O'Sullivan. While I would read the next book in the series, I won’t be going out of my way to see what happens next. Considering all of the other great books out there I don’t feel obligated or particularly excited read the next one (at least not anytime soon).

I give this book:★★★★

When a middle-aged man returns home for a funeral, he somehow finds himself at a farmhouse down the road from where he grew up. Trying to piece together why he was drawn there, this unnamed man’s mind is suddenly awash with details of forgotten memories involving Lettie Hempstock, the remarkable little girl who once lived there, and maybe still does.

Forty years earlier, the nameless man was just a nameless boy with a passion for reading and an affinity for his pet kitten. One day a peculiar man steals the family’s car and commits suicide down the road near the Hempstock farm. After the 7-year-old boy and his father go to retrieve the car, the boy’s life quickly turns into something out of one of his storybooks – sometimes fantastical, other times terrifying. Luckily for the boy, his new friend Lettie has sworn to protect him … no matter what.​A book that started out as a short story, The Ocean at the End of the Lane is an incredible work of fiction. An enchanting story about sacrifice and true friendship, this title has received a variety of awards and nominations, including winning the 2013 Goodreads Choice Awards for Fantasy. A book that Gaiman wrote “for anyone who has ever been seven years old," The Ocean at the End of the Lane is one not to be missed.

If you're looking for a read-alike title, John Connolly’s The Book of Lost Things is quite similar to The Ocean at the End of the Lane with its pacing, language and description of a young boy’s magical childhood. After the death of his mother, 12-year-old David seeks solace inside his beloved books. When the books begin to whisper to him, David soon finds it difficult to discern fantasy from reality. Thrown into a strange world that mirrors his own, David must navigate the terrors within – without the protection of little Lettie Hempstock.

Author

Tessa Fox is a 26-year-old Early Literacy Librarian at the Grayslake Area Public Library in Grayslake, Illinois. After working in the journalism and publishing fields, Tessa decided to dedicate her life to books and public librarianship, and went back to school to get her Master's in Library and Information Science from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, where she graduated in December 2016. Tessa has been working in public libraries for the past four years.